


oneiric

by nise_kazura



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Body Horror, Brief mentions of alcoholism and substance abuse, Dream Sex, Fake Castration, Gore, Hallucinations, M/M, Monsterfucking, Mpreg, Sleep Paralysis, Somnophilia, brief mentions of self-destructive thoughts, monster pregnancy, some will/oc but its so brief i decided not to tag it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-11
Updated: 2020-02-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:23:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22660153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nise_kazura/pseuds/nise_kazura
Summary: “Are we interpreting my dreams now? A bit Freudian, don’t you think?”“Only if the dream was sexual in nature.”Will flushes.He thinks of blood dripping black from a grinning mouth, the way the invisible weight on his chest lifted just enough for him to thrust his hips into the air, breaking the spell and waking him up to a pair of tented boxers.“It wasn’t a wet dream,” he denies.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 30
Kudos: 197
Collections: Hannigram Kinkmeme





	oneiric

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jonnimir](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jonnimir/gifts).
  * Translation into Русский available: [Онейрический](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27892861) by [SnakeCorps](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnakeCorps/pseuds/SnakeCorps)



> For the kinkmeme prompt:
> 
> During s1, Will begins to experience sleep paralysis in addition to his usual hallucinations etc. During the paralysis, he hallucinates the wendigo (or other monstrous/demonic form of Hannibal) is molesting him, and since he knows what sleep paralysis is, he later assumes the hallucination was a part of that, and tries not to think too much about it. But then he finds physical evidence to suggest the hallucination might not have been all in his head, after all. Your choice whether the explanation is supernatural or his brain's way of embellishing Hannibal's nightly visits.
> 
> -
> 
> there are some mild bestiality jokes in here lol. and one small moment that vaguely implies incestual thoughts too, if you squint a lot lmao. also, i didnt give this the graphic depictions of violence archive warning bc i dont rly think its that bad, but maybe my idea of “not that bad” is off? pls lmk if u think i made the wrong judgment call for that.
> 
> also i wrote like the last like 40% of this in one day, and im still wired from the experience so sorry if it feels rushed im just riding that Just Finished high before i can second-guess myself abt posting HAHA

He can’t move. The borders of his vision are blurred, the moonlight glowing brighter than it should from where it lays on the edge of his bed. Everything is stark in the cool light, even if he can’t seem to blink the gumminess from his eyes.

He can’t move. He can’t do anything. He knows his dogs are just over there, in the other room, but that’s too far. He can’t call out, he can barely breathe. An invisible weight crushes his chest, a constant compression locked around his ribs. His breath rasps in his throat, a weak, wheezing thing _._

He can’t move. But his mind is wide awake. The faint, fluttery sound of his heartbeat echoing like footsteps walking closer, but no one’s coming, no one will come.

It’s just him. Him, and the stag man.

If he doesn’t look at it directly, he can almost pretend it isn’t there. It melds with the shadows, shape bleeding into the darkness, an indistinct, wavering mass that watches with lightless eyes.

But he can feel it. Like a low hum in the background, a trembling of the windows. It’s there, and even if he tries not to look at it, it won’t go away. He lies there, awake, unmoving, and waits. Helpless.

When it stirs it does so with a languid fluidness that drools into the cracks and corners of the house. The moon is large in his window, caught in its antlers, ensnared. Ensnared, hooked. Like a rabbit in a trap, a fish on a line, like Will with an invisible weight on his chest.

There’s no reason for the stag man to hurry, so it doesn’t. It is slow and methodical, sure and precise with its every movement as the blankets slip off Will’s legs, as it trails its long, spindly fingers over his feet, his ankles, his shins, his knees. It seems abstractly curious, poking and prodding at his flesh with a sense of gentle alienation, long fingers stroking dry skin. Then it lowers its head, its magnificent antlers tilting downwards as it bends, and takes a long, deep sniff at Will’s crotch.

Something thrums up along the surface of Will’s skin, and he can feel the way he stirs as the thing rubs its face against where his boxers bunch up in the crease of his thighs. It inhales deeply and licks, its long, hot, wet tongue caressing the shape of him through thin cloth.

Will can do nothing but pant, feeling the way the tension in his body heightens as the stag man works him over, the most sensitive parts of him wrapped up in the soft, moist heat between sharp teeth. They scrape over his sensitive flesh, the nervous response flaring and prickling through his gut. Fear trips up his spine like fingers skimming peaked water.

The teeth are the only white part of the stag man. The rest is ebony black, eyes and all. It grins with Will’s cock still delicately gripped between its fangs, the ivory-white glowing eerily in the dark. 

And then they clamp down. 

Through the cloth, through the flesh.

Soundless, except for a clean squish. 

The stag man raises its head, triumphant, and it grins at him with blood dripping from its teeth, and that’s when Will finally jerks awake, shaking.

He checks surreptitiously under the blankets, and finds that his dick is, thankfully, still there. He is also very, very hard.

He decides to fix it with a cold shower, disturbed by his dream and his reaction to it, but dismissing it as just another nightmare.

* * *

“Antti Revusuo theorizes that dreams evolved as the brain’s way of constructing threatening scenarios in order to prepare for the real life event.”

“It’s far more likely that dreams are constructed as a way to process emotions. Got an excess of those, Doctor?”

Hannibal smiles, and predictably doesn’t rise to the bait.

“And if that emotion is fear?”

Will shifts, settling further into his seat, readying himself for another long, but interesting session with the good doctor.

“Are we interpreting my dreams now? A bit Freudian, don’t you think?”

“Only if the dream was sexual in nature.”

Will flushes.

He thinks of blood dripping black from a grinning mouth, the way the invisible weight on his chest lifted just enough for him to thrust his hips into the air, breaking the spell and waking him up to a pair of tented boxers.

“It wasn’t a wet dream,” he denies.

A flash of teeth, blinked away. Will rubs his eyes, but Hannibal looks as unruffled as he ever is.

“Fear and arousal are closely tied. After all, fear is a kind of excitement,” Hannibal reassures.

“It wasn’t a wet dream,” Will emphasizes, tapping his fingers and looking resolutely away from Hannibal.

Hannibal allows it with a tilt of his head. 

“You dream often.”

Will rubs a hand over his face, the shadows under his eyes seeming to deepen with just the simple reminder. “Yeah, bad sleeper. Always have been.”

“What was it about this dream that has you unsettled?”

“It didn’t. Unsettle me. It was just—it’s been awhile, since I’ve had sleep paralysis. Usually it’s a lot of night sweat and kicking off the blankets. Or sleepwalking.”

“Somnambulance would appear to be the opposite of sleep paralysis, that is true.”

“I suppose I should be grateful that it’s this instead of the sleepwalking, then. No more waking up on the roof.”

“What was your body looking for, on the roof?”

Will thinks of the way antlers threw shadows like cracks upon the walls, the way the stag man’s skin had glistered like blood-slick under the over-bright moon. The way it felt to be intimate with darkness.

“I don’t think it was looking for anything. It was looking to get away.”

* * *

Will has always been restless. Constantly wired, constantly alert. Always in survival mode.

So when he discovers himself trapped in stillness yet again, the paralyzing pressure on his limbs feels inherently unnatural, alien. It is not unlike the feeling of being watched.

Perhaps because he is.

The stag huffs a breath that puffs out against his cheek. The sensation can only sink skin-deep, the muscles underneath failing to work, unable to react. It skitters across the surface of him, makes him aware of the way he is bound to the limitations of his physical body. Locked inside, unable to escape. He is a paradox, a thing that is both dead, and afraid. 

Because he is afraid. The panic beats its fists against the dead meat he occupies, a loud fluttering in his chest. 

He is mouthwateringly fresh. Fresh meat, fresh kill. Dead, but the blood still flows. 

His eyes are open, but his vision goes dark. The stag is over him, smothering his vision in black. When he blinks, there is no difference. From the blackness comes an image. A face. A grinning skull, that glowing set of teeth, rictus grin. It emerges, materializes in front of him, takes shape by molding the shadows and leaving an imprint. Its pupilless eyes meet his, and hold.

Will’s breath rattles in his chest, the panicked fluttering crescendoing in his ears, unbearable. He can’t move. He can’t move.

His body is strangling itself, the fear inside him trembling violently, shaking apart, pushing futilely against his skin as it grows and grows and grows but cannot grow past its boundaries and the face is inches from his own, nightmarish grin now accompanied by a pair of arms, a pair of legs, a body, and the stag is now gone and it’s just Will and the stag man, eyes locked together and Will cannot look away, cannot run. The gaze upon him is ownership, he no longer belongs to himself, if he ever did. He can feel the way the darkness drains into him, just another invasion, just another not-him occupying and violating the space that was supposed to be designated for him.

Somehow, Will thinks that this time, he won’t be getting it back. No, not the same. 

He is not flesh but wet mud and clay, dark earth in which seed will be planted. 

The first point of contact is the hands clenching down on the sides of his ribcage, smoothing down his sides. Feeling out his silhouette, prepping the canvas. The stag man spends less time touching him this time, fingers trailing down to fish out his cock without hesitation. It knows what it wants. 

His boxers come off, and then his legs are falling limply open as the stag man wedges its hands under his ass and lifts, elbows bending, as though it were dipping its hands into a stream to drink. It laps at Will insistently, and he can do nothing but watch and wheeze, corpse breath whooshing wintry through his lips as the stag man dips its head to taste him, slippery warm tongue laving over his hole and perineum, up to his balls. It licks him open, making small, rumbly noises of contentment. Every time the slick muscle passes over his rim that part of him that is chained down and immobile flinches, and then flinches again at the way his muscles remain lax and open, compliant. Even the most animal responses of fight and flight remain dormant in him now, locked under a spell. He is not in control.

And then the stag man’s tongue wriggles inside him, opening him up. A tiny groan leaves his lips, and suddenly everything is shifting, sliding sideways as he discovers that part of him _likes_ how he’s splayed out so shamelessly, free to be moved by something other than the fear that rules him during the day. Free to give up responsibility for what will happen, for what happens to him. Free to give up his self.

He begins to wonder if he _wants_ to be in control.

The stag man seems to sense the shift inside of him, and for the first time, it speaks. It injects its thoughts directly into Will’s mind, voicelessly rattling his skull with an uncanny rumble that wrenches at his soul and paints wordless impressions across his vision, staining his malleable mind in its own colors.

**Hungry.**

Its presence in Will’s mind is muscles torn free from ligaments, skeleture ripped out from flesh, skin flayed until it falls away in rosebud curls.

**Hungry.**

Will can feel the yawning emptiness open up inside of him in response. He—it—is an unhinged jaw and a gulping throat. It—he—is a primordial, lethal unbeing of premonitory endings, the closest thing to predestination that its—his—prey will ever touch.

He—it—they are _ravenous,_ and nothing will ever sate the itch, the _ache_ embedded in their teeth _._

They feast on their flesh, nails scraping skin, burrowing into the red-black heat of living kill. A macabre, broken ouroboros set in humble Wolftrap, devouring themself in the bed of madness.

Will has never been of such a single mind as now, sharing his mind with an Other.

They smack their lips. Lower their feast from their aching mouth. Look into the eyes of the mirror.

**Eat.**

* * *

When Will wakes, no matter how much he scrubs and brushes, he can’t erase the iron taste of blood from his mouth.

Coffee alleviates it, but his lunch tastes the same. He runs his tongue over his teeth, making sure that nothing’s come loose, looking for wounds or sore spots that could explain the taste. But that just makes him uncomfortable, like he’s a masquerading wolf on the prowl for prey.

He has more coffee.

* * *

The dogs mill about, settling themselves down to sleep. Will watches them with a bit of fondness, a bit of envy. His eyes itch, dry and tired.

But his brain knocks about in his skull, thoughts of nothing flitting through the space between his ears, slippery. He rubs at that spot between his brows, resisting the urge to sigh again. He wants to stick a needle through his eyeball. Knock himself out with alcohol or maybe a brick.

In other words, nothing new.

He stares at a student’s paper in his hand, the words marching meaninglessly in front of his eyes. Blah blah, the perp is likely a white male, blah blah, look for past records of sexual assault, blah blah. It’s the same. They’re all the same. So many designs, but what difference does it make?

Maybe he suffers from childhood neglect, one student purports. 

Maybe he suffers from delusions, says another.

Maybe he’s just repressed, one half-asses.

Maybe he’s tired. 

Tired of being hounded by his boss. Tired of being trapped doing the only thing he knows how to do, but hates. Tired of slogging through the day, looking for a moment of rest, only to come home and find that he can’t sleep. 

By the end, he has a stack of papers with his illegible handwriting scrawled over them in red, a stress headache, and no less than six different methods of self-mutilation on hold for half-hearted consideration swirling in the back of his mind.

He pours himself a drink. Maybe two, or three. Does it matter? 

He goes to bed.

* * *

There’s an audience in the shadows. They seep in from the corners of the room, soft and sable, disseminating themselves about in the saturnine gloom.

It’s the same as before. Heartbeat like fluttering wings against his birdcage ribs. An attempt to cry out that yields only a choked wheeze. 

Movement beneath the sheets. 

There is something in bed with him.

Fingers fit themselves between the notches of his ribs. He is naked. When did that happen?

The something shifts between the blankets, sliding smooth over his thighs, hovering over him now, looming, and it nudges his hardening cock with a sure touch. Traces a fingertip down the head, to the stretch of skin behind his balls, to the pucker of his asshole. 

It isn’t the first time Will has had something in his ass. Far from it, actually. But it’s the first time he’s been unable to move, unable to grind back against the intrusion. The first time he’s done this without any agency to speak of.

Will is distantly aware that he’s terrified. But the thrill of fear tingles flicker-bright deep down in his belly, and he realizes he likes being this sort of terrified.

Antlers rise from beneath the bed sheets as the stag man tilts its head up to regard Will with its blankly curious gaze.

Its desire is a like a live wire humming and sparking, stretched taut between them. Will can feel his body reacting in response, and so when the finger turns into two, to three, they are accepted with ease. He opens, like a flower unfurling its petals. He opens—his legs, his ass, his mouth—lips parting as the stag man melds their faces together and all Will can taste is blood, hyper-aware of the slide, the wet squish of raw meat between his teeth, of the cock sinking deep inside of him. 

He is hungry, and being fed from both ends. Hands clamp down on his hips, and the room begins to tremor, walls rattling, vision vibrating. The stag man’s face seems to flicker, a mirage. His breath comes out in wet pants, the air pushed out of him at the rhythm of its thrusts. Sweat trickles down his thighs, makes the backs of his knees slippery. His limp legs dangle in the air. 

It is strange, fucking without having control over his body. When the cock inside of him brushes over that spot, he can’t even twitch in response. He doesn’t twist into the hold of the large hands that wrap around him, he doesn’t arch his back or moan. He can only lie there and take it, cock hardening and drooling against his belly, his breath mingling with the stag man’s, blood mist. It’s claws dig in deeper, gouging flesh, black blood welling up against the paleness of his skin. The bed squeaks. The taste of blood continues to flood Will’s mouth. He thinks he might be crying, but he doesn’t know if it’s from pleasure or from pain.

The stag man lifts a hand and puts it around his neck, pressing down, and Will’s climax hits him like a freight train.

He thinks he hears someone say his name, and then he slips back into unconsciousness.

* * *

He feels stiff, sore. That’s nothing new. Neither are the aches and pains all over his body. Will has forgotten what it feels like to be well-rested—his is an existence that floats between anxiously wired and eye-burningly cranky. 

Cotton-mouthed and gummy-eyed, he floats into wakefulness like a three-week-old corpse buoyed by bacterial gases. That is to say, still face-down in the water and ultimately, still drowned. His entire side screeches in protest when he twists, fumbling for his phone to hit the alarm, eyes already feeling like they’re about to fall out of his head. God, did he even sleep at all last night? It certainly doesn’t feel like it. 

Alarm stopped, he lets out a sigh of relief. He looks to the side, sees his dogs with their mouths hanging open and tongues lolling, tails thumping on the ground as they wait patiently for their food and morning runs. His face scrunches as he looks down at the phone resting on his chest, and thats when he notices that his bedsheets are…neat. He knows he didn’t sleep well, and yet…they aren’t bunched around his legs or kicked off near the foot of the bed the way they are most mornings. Like someone came over in the middle of the night to tuck him in. 

Something jiggles the doorknob to the backdoor of his brain, a stranger trying to make their way in. Will ignores it.

Or at least, he ignores it until he sits up and hisses at the way his t shirt clings and tugs at the bloody gouges along his sides. 

The stranger is already in the room. They’ve been in his bed. 

Will scrambles up, feet hitting the cold floors as he totters jerkily to the bathroom so he can inspect the marks more carefully. When he strips down, he finds bruises all over his hips and backside. Faint red marks on his throat. When he steps into the shower, the new scratches he didn’t notice before light up along his thighs under the hot water.

Will closes his eyes and just breathes. He tilts his head back, lets the water run over his face, fill his mouth and overflow. Then he wipes a hand down his face and leans his forehead against the shower wall, trying to ground himself.

Okay.

Was there any way he could’ve gotten those injuries without noticing or remembering?

Will frantically searches his memories, but he can’t think of a time when he so much as bumped into something hard enough to bruise. He hasn’t gone tramping through the woods recently, so none of the gouges could be from a wayward branch or bush, even if he didn’t bundle up the way he usually does. 

He’d rather his mind freefall into madness than leap to the conclusions it is trying to resolve. 

Because the only remaining answer is that his dreams are real. The sleep paralysis, the stag man, the freaky dream-sex—real. And isn’t that madness, anyway?

Will takes a deep breath, steps out of the shower, dripping wet with a towel clutched around his waist, and calls Hannibal.

* * *

Hannibal’s nostrils flare when he opens the door.

“Will.”

“Doctor Lecter,” he parrots back, feeling uncharacteristically (or, perhaps, characteristically) prickly. 

Hannibal’s eyes trace his figure, something glinting in his eyes. He seems pleased to see Will at his doorstep at 7 o’clock on a Sunday. Satisfied, like a job well done.

“Come in,” Hannibal says, and he doesn’t even seem remotely annoyed that Will had already been shouldering past him before the words had left his mouth.

“Could someone be stalking me?” Will asks.

“Could the wounds have been self-inflicted?”

Will starts a bit at the question, and turns to regard Hannibal through squinted eyes. His feet pause, and then he turns back around, heading towards the kitchen, slipping into the rhythm of their back-and-forth easily.

“I guess—yeah, I could reach all of them, but it would require some serious contortion for some of them.”

“But it’s possible.”

Will lets out a frustrated huff, jittery hands running themselves through his hair. He jerks his head into a tilt and quirks a brow in mockery of acquiescence.

“Yeah, it’s _possible._ Just not likely.”

“Then why are you here?”

Will snaps his head up to look at Hannibal quizzically. His glasses are sliding down his nose, his eyes red-rimmed and baggy.

“What?”

“I am your psychiatrist, Will. If you really thought that this was something serious, that someone or something was in your home, you would go to the police. But you brought this issue to me. Some part of you must suspect that this is—”

“—All in my head? Is that what you’re saying?” Will resists the urge to strip, show Hannibal the extent of it all. To shove it in his face and dare him to say that again. _Is this in my head too? Did I make this up? Tell me._

As it is, he just tugs at his collar, bringing attention to the light bruises forming there.

Hannibal gives a slow blink, tipping his head in graceful capitulation. 

Will had come to him because he wanted to know if it was real. If he was awake.

He doubts his choice, now. Standing here in Hannibal’s kitchen, watching Hannibal make them coffee, everything seems to float on the surface of an invisible current. Drifting and wavering, dreamlike. There is a quality to Hannibal that has always been somewhat distant and strange. Will had been using Hannibal as his grounding reference point for sanity and clarity. A tether that he can follow, trace back to the start. But now, for the first time, he wonders if perhaps Hannibal is suspended in the same space as he, that torpid, oil-slick blackness that haunts his wake. If perhaps there is no start, just an endless loop without end.

“You’re my paddle,” he says instead.

“That I am,” Hannibal says. “But you must fix the leak in your boat first.”

 _Tell me how to do that,_ Will wants to say. Instead, he just purses his lips.

“Will you be staying for dinner?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t want to impose—”

“It is no problem. I have already prepared enough for two.”

“Well, then—I guess.”

They don’t talk about it any more that night. When Will leaves, pulling out of Hannibal’s driveway, he wonders if Hannibal is on the phone at that moment, calling Jack Crawford. Reporting on his illness. He feels faintly sick, but ignores it.

What comes will come. Maybe a break would be good for him, who knows? 

* * *

There’s a dull pressure pounding behind Will’s eyes. When he blinks he has to remind himself to open his eyes again, peeling his eyelids back like scraping gum from cement. Shaking out two more ibuprofen and swallowing them dry with a slow gulp, he stares at the powerpoint on his laptop. His retinas have been seared by the cool blue light, discorporate after-images of crime scenes sticking to the center of his vision like an oily fingerprint. 

_—White, male. Sadist. Likes to—_

Rend. Tear. Swallow screams and crunch them between his teeth like hard candy, so he can run his tongue back over his teeth later and still taste the fear.

_—mutilate, torture. Distinctive—_

Joy. Unadulterated glee, a hit injected straight into the veins, liberation through destruction. Through utter disregard.

_—design. A kind of cruelty—_

She was just so pretty. With her curls and eyes and hands and—

_—very common in narcissists that think they’re special—_

So vulnerable. So breakable. Looking at him with those blue, blue eyes, how could he resist?

_—motivated by sexual desire—_

The neck is just so bare, so white. He caresses it, feels the live, squirming pulse under diaphanous skin. Just a taste. Just a little.

_—victim profile—_

He’s gasping now, stained red and looking up at me with those blue eyes and with those pretty curls and oh, he likes it, he does, doesn’t he? I tell him how beautiful he is like this, how much I love the way he breaks apart and he smiles back up at me with that familiar face of mine—

  
  
  


Will jerks awake to the photos plastered across his screen. The victim is female and blonde, but he can still see himself there, flesh open and welcoming, eyes rapturous, mouth open in ecstasy.

He abandons lesson plans for the day.

* * *

Does he want to be in control? Does he want to fight back?

The heaviness in Will’s limbs seem to answer that for him. They give him the answer he doesn’t want, make it true even if it wasn’t supposed to be. What he wants doesn’t matter—the truth asserts itself, wrapping him around its trellis, weaving him into its shape. It doesn’t matter anymore. He’ll want it because he’s supposed to want it. And the want is definitely there. It spreads like an ache, blooming over his skin like ink drops in water. He’s fluid, so fluid. Edges lapping up against that which contains him, forms him. Holds him, the way the stag man does.

Its hand drags down from his collarbone to his sternum and down to his belly. It strokes the soft skin there, the trail of hair. It coos, a low warbling tone that sounds like mourning at a distance.

It’s gentle today. Opening him up with care, making deep rumbly noises in its chest before it slides in, waiting for each of Will’s even exhales to push. It purrs its content, nuzzles the side of Will’s cheek. Will can feel its affection like broken glass lodged beneath the bottom edge of his rib cage—sharp, bleeding, the pain causing blood to rush to the site of injury, suffusing his core with warmth. It reaches down between them to fondle Will’s cock as it settles into a deep, rolling rhythm that echoes up Will’s spine like waves of dominos falling into each other. The other hand is anchored on his waist.

When it comes it does so with a sigh, the flood reaching into the spaces of Will, settling an unease inside him that he hadn’t been aware of. It licks its knuckles clean of Will’s cum, then spreads both hands over his belly again, the touch light. 

It lowers its head so that its antlers crowd Will’s vision, then slowly drives forward until the sharp tips sink into his chest and neck, pinning him down. Blood fills the back of his throat, he feels a lung collapse, he cannot breathe around the taste of rust and iron chains.

It feels like a kiss.

**Mine.**

The hands on his stomach rub soothing patterns over his skin.

**Mine.**

* * *

When Will wakes up, he’s sick. He sweats and trembles over the toilet bowl, shaking fingers gripping the porcelain as yellowish bile drips from his lips. The nausea is painful and makes his head throb even more than it usually would. He wonders if he should call in sick, if perhaps whatever he’s coming down with is contagious. 

Then he reasons that he doesn’t get close enough to people from behind the lecture podium to really infect anyone and if any of his students try to come up to speak with him it’s obviously their fault since they should know better by now. So he brushes his teeth vigorously, and pops a few more pills. He deliberately doesn’t count them.

It comes and goes, and he deals with it the way he deals with all things—ungracefully and fueled only by a deep, hateful spite for general existence. It gets so bad he can’t even stand the smell of coffee. His shirts all feel too tight, especially around the chest, and it’s even harder than usual to get out of bed in the mornings. It feels like some kind of stomach bug, or the beginning of something worse. He drinks as much water as he can, and finds himself power-walking between classes to get to the bathroom to relieve himself. What the fuck even is the use of this horrible flesh bag he calls a body? All it does is ache and complain, and he really doesn’t need any more of that in his life. Living in his head alone is enough of a punishment for him, thanks.

It’s in this state that Hannibal pays him a visit.

He arrives with a basket of ingredients under one arm, and some treats for the dogs in the other.

“You spoil them you know,” Will says, awkwardly shifting back and forth on his feet. He’s overly aware of the fact that he’s, once again, in just his pajamas and completely underdressed compared to Hannibal, nevermind that he’s in his own home. Hannibal with his perfectly coiffed hair and expensive-looking three-piece suits. A dark blue one with a matching paisley tie and vermillion accents, today. A suit that is currently getting dog hair all over it.

“Hey!” He gives a sharp whistle, and the dogs back off, though they still circle Hannibal and Will, as though aware of the tidal pull between them. 

“What’s the special occasion?” Will asks. “And would you like something to drink?”

Hannibal, against all odds, seems very familiar with his surroundings. At ease, comfortable. He waves Will away and heads towards the stove himself.

“I heard through the grapevine that you weren’t feeling well.”

Will grunts, settling himself down in his armchair, welcoming Winston’s warmth as he settles over Will’s feet.

“Didn’t know people liked talking about me so much,” he says, rueful.

“You have people who care about you, Will.”

“So you drove all the way out to Wolf Trap, Virginia to check on me?”

Hannibal offers him a smile and a warm mug of tea.

“Precisely.” He nods towards the cup, “Ginger tea with goji berries. My own blend.”

Will takes a sip, the sharp taste slipping down into him and warming him from the inside out. Something inside him that had been jittery and clenched relaxes, turns noodly and pliant.

“Thank you,” he says sincerely. “It’s good.”

“I’m glad,” Hannibal says. “You don’t mind if I use your kitchen?”

He hadn’t exactly asked permission to make the tea, but Will allows it with a tilt of his head, one hand reaching down to scratch behind Winston’s ears, toes curling under warm fur.

“Go ahead.”

“It shouldn’t take long,” Hannibal says over the click of the stove. “It just needs to heat.”

“Came prepared, did you?”

“Of course.”

Will swallows, feeling strange, being the one taken care of.

“You sure you don’t want a drink? I’ve been told I make a mean old-fashioned.”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” Hannibal says. “And please, as a former physician I must ask that you monitor your alcohol intake while you’re ailing.”

Will grimaces, chagrined. “I was wondering why it wasn’t wine this time,” he grumbled.

“Perhaps after you’re well again,” Hannibal reassures. He lifts his head, takes a whiff of the air, then heads back to the stove. “It should be ready now.”

Will stands up, carefully stepping around Winston as he heads towards the table. Hannibal emerges with two bowls. Blue-and-white china, with delicate patterns all over them. Will holds back a snort. Of course Hannibal brought his own dishes.

“A simple recipe,” Hannibal says. “Something you could easily make yourself at home, with ingredients that are relatively easy to procure.”

Will is skeptical, but he picks up the spoon to give it a taste, allowing that this is the first thing today that hasn’t turned his stomach at just the smell.

Hannibal smiles and sets himself down across from Will. “I think you’ll find it quite nourishing. I can give you the recipe if you’d like.”

“One of Dr. Hannibal Lecter’s famous recipes?” Will flashes him a playful grin, holding a dramatic hand to his chest. “How could I say no?”

They share a chuckle. 

Will, to his surprise, finishes his soup. He feels pleasantly full and warm in a way that he didn’t realize he’d needed. A moment of hard-won relaxation.

“Thank you,” he says, again.

“Not doubting my culinary prowess, are you?” Hannibal teases.

“Never. I wouldn’t dare,” Will laughs.

Hannibal reaches down to scratch Zoë behind the ears, who’d begun to butt her nose against his ankle.

“You’ve built yourself quite the family here,” he ventures.

Will hums.

“I suppose.”

“Have you ever thought about children, Will?”

Will chokes at the sudden topic change.

“I wouldn’t want to make you work after hours, Doctor,” he reminds.

“Just a conversation between friends,” Hannibal assures.

“Isn’t that what they always are?”

“Isn’t it?”

They look at each other for a moment before Will relents.

“This isn’t about Abigail, is it.”

“No.”

“Biological children?”

“If you’ve ever thought about it.”

“Can’t say I have,” Will says, leaning back in his chair. “I’m single. Been fine that way, too. Got my dogs. My fishing.”

“Your job,” Hannibal agrees.

Will snorts. “Yeah, and that.”

“Children are opportunities. Opportunities to live past our age, opportunities to enrich our lives with youth that we’ve already lost.” Hannibal’s voice takes on a wistful tone. “They can be an opportunity to build something that wouldn’t be possible alone.”

Will sets his mug aside, folding his hands together on the table.

“You know, Hannibal, you don’t need to lead the conversation with questions and riddles. Is it someone I know?”

He has to admit that he’s curious. Who could’ve caught the eye of someone like Hannibal Lecter? Will, even with all his imagination, can’t quite seem to picture what kind of woman Hannibal would prefer, especially one that could capture his interest so soundly that he would consider giving up his current way of life in order to make way for children. 

Hannibal smiles.

“Perhaps.”

Will rolls his eyes.

“There you go again, being all mysterious. Fine, I won’t ask.”

After a moment, he thinks better of it. “It…It isn’t Alana, is it?”

Hannibal frowns. “No, I assure you, it is not, dear Will.”

Will’s eyebrows raise further.

“Must be quite something, then,” he says.

“They are,” Hannibal agrees.

* * *

There’s a yawning ache deep in Will’s belly that he’s never felt before. He feels restless, like a swarm of flies trying to eat their way out of his skin. But he’s frozen—locked in place, the shadows laced across his body like iron bars pressing him down into the bed. He tries to call out, call it back to him, begging for relief, but he’s out of breath before he can even open his mouth. The ever-present panic settles in the nooks and crannies of his chest, holding his voice hostage.

It hears him anyway, his monster. It settles over him with a sigh, seemingly content with just laying over him, with just skin-to-skin contact. It should scare Will—the extra weight restricts his movement even further, another layer of entrapment. Instead, Will spills into the mold, the space that fits just right beneath the stag man. He relaxes into his bonds, stops fighting it. There’s no _need_ to fight anymore. He’s safe here. 

Its hands stroke his belly, the small bit of roundness at his beltline. The coolness of its skin is soothing, a breath of fresh air underneath his sweaty blankets.

It fucks him gently. Reverently. With every push and pull, Will finds that his breath is returned to him. The weight on his chest releases. Life is breathed into his corpse, heat curling deep in his belly. 

For the first time, he is able to respond. He reaches up to wrap his hands around the stag man’s antlers, pulling its face towards him, and kisses it deeply. It tastes like earth and iron and leather and, faintly, something like pork. It wraps its arms around his back, cradles him close to its cavernous chest, drinks his quiet moans from his lips. When it spills into Will, fills him up, Will feels a strange sort of contentment settle over him, a peaceful glow that calms him and puts him straight back to sleep.

* * *

When Will wakes, it’s an easy rise through the murky waters, for once. When he peels back the neat covers, he stares down at the lilac smattering of bruises on his hips, the wet spot on his boxers, and thinks, somewhat absurdly, that perhaps he should feel ashamed. The memory of his latest dream shimmers somewhere behind his eyelids, mocking him. Mocking his proclivities.

 _Well that settles it,_ he decides. _I’m officially pent up._

That’s the only explanation. (The easiest, most acceptable explanation.)

He checks his calendar, and confirms what he already knows: he has the next night pretty free.

He brushes his teeth, then leans his palms against the edge of the counter and looks himself, tired eye to tired eye, in the mirror.

“You need to get fucked, Graham,” he grumbles.

* * *

The man is big. Burly. His name is Harley, which Will promptly forgets because he’s had too much whiskey and because he once had a dog named Harley and he’s not about to disrespect her memory by thinking about her with cock up his ass, thank you very much.

But it’s a nice cock, Will can give Harley that. Thick. And it’s a good fuck, Will can give him that, too. Straightforward. Doggy style. Some cursory prep, a polite inquiry on how he’s doing, and then nice and fast and hard. Just how he likes it. When he comes it’s with a whine and a gasp and to a “that’s it, baby,” grunted into his ear. He finishes him off with his mouth, choking and slobbering over fat cock just how his first college fuckbuddy taught him, then rolls over and passes out with cum still painted on his face.

He doesn’t dream.

* * *

“So, your experiment was successful.”

“If by ‘experiment’ you mean getting fucked to avoid bad dreams that may or may not be the cause of self-mutilation, sure.”

“You must realize, Will, that if this is your solution, it is not sustainable.”

Will laughs.

“Nothing’s sustainable. Pick at anything enough and it’ll fall apart eventually.”

“Do you plan on continuing your sexual liaisons?”

Will shrugs noncommittally. Hannibal sighs.

“Will,” he admonishes.

“Don’t—You’re not my father.”

“No. I am your friend.”

Will sighs through his nose.

“And I don’t have many of those. Is that what you’re trying to say, Doctor?”

Hannibal folds his hands over his lap and considers Will with measured eyes.

“I would hope that you would value a friend’s concern, yes. But refusing to take my advice won’t result in a revocation of my friendship, Will. Are you used to your relationships being conditional?”

Will grimaces.

“I’d rather not psychoanalyze that particular detail today, if you don’t mind, Doctor.”

“Hannibal.”

Will pauses, opening and then closing his mouth in an attempt to stifle his surprise.

“I think we’re on first name basis by now, don’t you?”

Will furrows his brow, but concedes with a small nod.

“Hannibal,” he corrects.

Hannibal smiles.

“I’ll let the subject go for today, but you must deal with your relationship insecurities at some point, Will.”

Will sighs and gives another jerky nod, eyes darting away nervously.

“Now, tell me about the investigation Jack has you on.”

Will immediately snaps to attention, body tensing and fingers curling.

“It’s the Ripper,” he says.

“Jack must be overjoyed.”

“He doesn’t believe me.”

“Why is that?”

“It’s…messy. Not refined, the way Ripper kills usually are. None of his ironic humor, none of the artistic finesse. This one was different for him. The victim was so mutilated they don’t have an ID on the body yet. Fingerprints and teeth are gone.”

Hannibal leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he studies Will critically, eyes glinting in the low light.

“What makes you so sure it’s the Ripper?”

“Something made him upset,” Will continues, as though Hannibal hadn’t spoken. Hannibal purses his lips. “Something personal. But it’s still him. Only he could do something this brutal without leaving a trace.”

“Surely the forensics team hasn’t finished combing through all of the evidence yet. Perhaps something will come up.”

“No,” Will stood up and began pacing, fingers rubbing at his stubbled chin in thought. “The rage was…incandescent. They didn’t need my help to see that. But the burn was cold. Precise. I could feel a...a soft rime, all over the scene. They won’t find anything.”

“Then how will you catch him?”

Will snorts.

“The Ripper? Not by waiting for him to make a mistake, that’s for sure.”

“You mean to be proactive. To hunt.”

“No, he knows that game too well. He’s a predator. We have to bring him to us.”

“Lure him, you mean.”

“Gotta know what will make him bite.”

Hannibal face shutters, shifts slightly and slips into a countenance uncommonly solemn.

“If anyone were to know, it would be you, Will.”

* * *

The investigation goes, the way investigations go. They don’t find anything.

Will grows more and more tired on his feet every day. He feels as though he’s trying to swim out of a thick duvet every waking second. His shirts always seem too itchy for him, chafing against his strangely-tender chest. He stops pacing during his lectures in favor of standing by the podium because of chronic dizziness. His headaches get worse.

The weirdest part, though, is the food. He’s always hungry, yet periodically nauseous so he can’t seem to keep anything down.

Nothing but Hannibal’s cooking.

He asks for recipes and tries them himself, but it’s never quite the same. Something in the ingredients, maybe?

Eventually it becomes too much and he admits defeat. He has vacation days to spare anyway, so he calls off work and asks Alana to step in for him.

Hannibal visits him with a giant basket of food, fusses like a mother hen in his kitchen. When he leaves Will’s fridge is fully restocked with meat, milk, eggs, vegetables, and enough pre-cooked leftovers for Will to live off of for at least a couple more days.

Will finishes it within a few hours. He can’t help it, he’s just so _hungry._ He feels bloated and sluggish but inside his stomach cramps constantly, begging to be filled. He feels like an empty meat receptacle, in constant need of feeding. A fleshy vacuum cleaner.

He’s also really, really fucking horny. He dials the number Harley had pressed into his palm the morning after, digging it back up from the bottom of his trash can, but no one answers. He jerks off furiously, playing with himself for at least half an hour, lube dripping from his fingers and onto the sheets, arm cramping up from the awkward angle, but to no avail—horny as he is, his own hands aren’t going to cut it this time.

Hannibal’s voice echoes in his head.

_“Do you plan on continuing your sexual liaisons?”_

_Fuck you,_ Will thinks. _You don’t get a say in who I fuck._

But he’s also definitely coming down with something. He’s not sure if he can make it to a bar without throwing up on the side of the road. He also looks like complete shit. Plus, it would be rude, wouldn’t it? To go looking for a fuck knowing that you’d very likely get them sick?

So he stays at home, hugging his dogs and feeling miserable. Whenever he gets up to open the door and let them out, or to stand by the stove as he makes yet another attempt at a meal, his entire body feels…strange. Like it isn’t his. His balance always feels weirdly off, like his center of mass has shifted.

Night falls. He lies awake listening to the crickets. He finds himself rubbing his stomach absently, petting it, as though trying to soothe a hungry monster lying curled up inside. He shifts, awkward, then kicks off the blankets. There’s something sizzling under his skin, and his failed jerk-off session earlier hadn’t helped.

Sighing, he rolls over onto his stomach and gets his knees under his hips.

“Please,” he breathes. “I need it.”

The stag man growls from the corner. It slinks forward, emerging from the dark, black form cutting through the moonlight. Its shadow swallows Will whole, draping across the wall as it covers Will with his body. He’s still slick from earlier, so it slides in with no trouble, right down to the hilt. Will groans softly, relaxing under the weight, and begins to rock slightly, back and forth, back and forth. It croons at him, a strange, rumbly sound of affection that Will can feel deep in his bones.

It rakes its fingers down his flanks then smooths a palm over his stomach, purring. Slowly the pace kicks up until the bed is squeaking and Will is biting into his pillow, sweat collecting in the dip of his back. It flips him over on his back and kisses him, holding him tenderly to its chest and wrapping a hand around Will’s cock to bring him to completion.

When it’s over, Will lies there, panting. One itch has been scratched, but not the other.

**Hungry.**

Yes, they’re hungry.

Will swings his legs over the edge of the bed, feet landing softly on the cool floor. He totters his way towards the kitchen, moving carefully.

**Hungry.**

He needs to feed them. Both of them. The refrigerator casts a sallow light upon his skin, the cold brushing against his face as he opens it.

**Hungry.**

He lifts his hands to his mouth—

* * *

Will wakes kneeling in front of his refrigerator. He’s holding a piece of meat, a steak that Hannibal had left for him when he restocked his kitchen. It’s raw, watery blood dripping between his fingers and to the floor. He stares at it, uncomprehending. For a moment all he’s aware of is the desire to bite into it, to feel the squish of flesh between his teeth, to have the coppery taste fill his mouth. He brings the meat closer, holding it in his palm like an offering.

_Maybe just a taste. Just one bite. What can it hurt? No one has to know._

It’s the last thought that snaps him back into his body.

He puts the meat back, and gets up to go wash his hands. He’s shaking. Even as he stands in his bathroom, splashing water on his face, he can feel it. A tug, from deep within his belly, calling him back towards the kitchen. Reminding him that it’s _there._ That he could. That he _wants_ to.

* * *

Eventually, he gathers the courage to go back to the kitchen. He handles the meat as little as he can, but makes sure to cook _all_ of it, before he can get any more funny ideas. He wonders what Hannibal would say if he knew that Will planned on pre-cooking, refrigerating, and then simply microwaving the doubtlessly expensive meat that he’d been given. Topped off with barbecue sauce? He’d perish.

But when Will finishes, he feels a weight lift off his shoulders. The tug is still there, but it’s less. Feels more like normal hunger. He grabs the barbecue sauce and polishes off a plate, then leans back in his chair, patting his stomach.

It’s grown, a little. Just a small pouch, a bit of paunch. It shouldn’t be a surprise—he’s done nothing but lay around the house and eat ever since he figured out that, for whatever reason, he could actually keep Hannibal’s food down.

 _It really must be something in the ingredients,_ he reasons. He hasn’t thrown anything up yet today, despite the fact that he’d cooked the meat himself. He’ll have to ask where Hannibal gets it. Why does Hannibal bring him so much meat, anyway?

After his meal, he feels much better. More settled. Sated. Maybe he can get back to work sooner than he’d anticipated.

As if on cue, his cellphone rings, Jack’s name lighting up the screen. He picks up.

“Got an ID on the body. A Harley Johnson. Think you could come down?”

The name pings in Will’s head, a high, clear note. Harley? Like his dead dog, Harley?

He scrambles for the scrap of receipt that had the number he’d dialed just a day before.

 _Harley J,_ it reads.

Fuck. Coincidence?

It has to be.

But it won’t look that way to Jack. They’ll probably check his phone records, find out that Will had called him just a day before. And Will hardly ever takes time off—for him to finally go on a break right after they find the body?

“I don’t know,” he says, “I really don’t feel all that great, Jack.”

“Need me to drive up there and get you?”

_Think, Graham. Think._

The fact that he called Harley _after_ the body had been found may be a point in his favor. Why would he call a man if he’d already murdered him?

But it’s still a connection. A connection that Will doesn’t need. They’d still investigate him, put him on a suspect list. Is it better to come clean? Tell Jack the truth? He has nothing to hide, he didn’t do anything.

They’d fucked in a motel. They could trace Harley’s steps from the bar to there, but they won’t find any evidence after room service has gone through and after the room had already been rented out to other people.

Why is he so scared? What is he afraid they’re gonna find?

_Stop it. Just tell him. Hiding makes it look worse._

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean you can’t?”

“Dr. Lecter’s orders. Can’t work until I’m better.”

Jack sighs.

“We need you down here, Will.”

“I told you, it’s the Ripper. You don’t believe me. Not sure if I can be of much help to you when you won’t listen, Jack.”

“If it’s the Ripper, then this might be our best chance to catch him. It’s different from all his other kills.”

“I said no, Jack.”

Will can feel Jack’s disapproval through the phone.

“Call me when you change your mind.”

“If.”

“Sure. ‘If.’”

The call ends.

Will begins to pack.

* * *

In the end, he doesn’t call Hannibal. He just makes arrangements for his dogs, packs a small suitcase of necessities, and leaves.

He ditches the car and goes by public transportation, avoiding street cameras until he comes across a dingy motel (not unlike the one Harley had fucked him in) and settles down to wait for the inevitable knock.

It doesn’t come.

Will orders take-out, pays in cash. The sickness comes back, and he finds himself sweating in a cool room as he fights to find a comfortable position on the lumpy mattress. The food is fine, objectively, but he just. Can’t. Keep. Anything. Down. He gets used to the taste of vomit in his mouth and drinks a lot of water.

He really starts to notice it when the waistband of his boxers start to irritate his skin, digging in deeper than they usually would.

And then he decides to venture out for a day, just so he won’t go insane, and finds that he can’t pull up his pants.

It doesn’t make sense. He’s _starving._ He hasn’t been able to eat. And yet his stomach seems to be swelling. It looks a bit like a beer belly, except that instead of sagging over his beltline the skin is stretched taut like a drum. He can see the faint patterns of veins underneath his skin.

“I must be going crazy,” he mutters as he looks at himself in the mirror. Because it really only looks like one thing but it’s—it’s not possible.

First of all, he’s _male._ Second of all, he’s _male._ Third of all, the rate at which his stomach is swelling does _not_ follow the nine month timeline of human pregnancy.

A tumor? Some other kind of parasitic growth?

His sleep is tortured. He sees his old dog, Harley, watching him from the door. He sees Abigail, whispering something he can’t hear into his ear, looking afraid. He sees his father, he imagines big men with big hands all over him, wakes up whimpering with a _need,_ an _ache_ deep inside him.

At this point, he almost wishes Jack would just find him already. What the hell is taking them so long? The FBI can be discreet. That’s what he needs right now—discreet. He doesn’t try to leave again, afraid of being seen. When food delivery comes he leaves the chain on the door and opens it only by a crack, asking them to leave the food outside while he shoves bills in their hands. The blinds remain closed at all times.

It’s official. He’s some kind of freak. He’s always been some kind of freak, but not _this_ kind of freak. It’s like everything inside him, everything dark and twisted and _wrong_ has physically manifested, is about to burgeon from his skin, burst him open until one day someone will find him lying dead, stomach split open, the monster of his nightmares crawling out, fully-formed.

 _“I knew it,”_ they’d all say. _“I knew something was wrong with that guy.”_

He plays with the idea that it’s hallucinatory. That it’s all in his head. He very nearly dials Hannibal once, desperate for something to anchor him. In the end, he doesn't. Too afraid of confirmation, too afraid of what'll happen when this nightmare meets the one stable point of his reality. Afraid of which one will win out.

He misses his dogs.

Five days in, he can count his vertebrae, each rib. His arms are sticks. He can barely stand, tottering on tooth-pick limbs as the giant, swollen, cyst of his belly sucks the rest of him in, devouring him. By the end he’ll be a giant fleshy sphere, a blister ready to pop, with just a few vestigial limbs dangling off the sides. He looks at himself in the mirror and doesn’t recognize his face. The unfamiliar angles of it, the impression of a skull beneath skin. The way the shadows slice into him, so sharp that when he lifts a shaky hand—knobby fingers, floppy wrists—to touch, he expects there to be blood.

Sometimes he thinks that the hunger pangs aren’t hunger pangs, but the movement of something inside, kicking him. All his neuroses and hallucinations, finally being brought to life. And all it took was the consumption of his body, his physical existence. Law of conservation of energy—new matter being brought into being in exchange for his. Literally being consumed by his madness.

Sometimes he dreams about cutting his belly open. Of reaching in, grasping a hand, and wrenching the thing out. Of bringing it into being, screeching, and strangling it while it’s only halfway out of his womb. Giving birth to death. Or giving birth to his own murderous impulses, rather. Sometimes he finds himself gripping a shard of the broken mirror (when had he broken the mirror?), poised over the diaphanous skin of the parasitic growth. He has to bandage his hands after that. The blood flow is sluggish, thick and congealed. Dark against the paleness of his fluorescence-sallowed skin. 

Sometimes he counts his breaths and his heartbeats and imagines that it’s all slowing down, like clockwork. He lies back on the bed, hands rubbing at the growth, and imagines himself dying, the light leaving his eyes, just like that. Staring up at the speckled ceiling, seeing nothing. He thinks that maybe then the growth will bloom from him, sucking what little nutrients remain in his desiccated corpse, before detaching itself and walking away.

He imagines someone who looks like him but isn’t him, sitting in the corner and watching with unsettling eyes, just waiting. Waiting to take his place. It’ll peel off his skin, and with it all of his inhibitions, all of the _sanity_ that allows him to keep his shape, his identity, and underneath there will be the Other Will Graham, the superior doppelgänger, ready to step into his place.

The door rattles.

_"Will Graham?"_

The Other Will grins at him, a childish, silly smile of delight. He stands in the doorway, on the threshold between him and the real world. The guard, the gatekeeper, the final obstacle.

_"Are you Will Graham?"_

"Have you come to kill me?" Will’s voice is thin and reedy. “Is that why you’re here?”

He reaches for the Other as it draws closer, grips it by the hand as tightly as he can. He won't let go. Not again. If one of them leaves, both of them leave. If one stays, they both stay. He won't let him get away. He won't let him get away with this.

“I’m not afraid anymore. You can’t do anything to me. I’m invincible now.”

_"There's something wrong with you."_

"It's no use," the Other says. "He's coming."

Will crawls forward, top-heavy, the sensitive, stretched skin of his belly hanging low, brushing the sheets.

"Who?"

_"Let go of me!"_

"You know who. He's not the only one either. You're coming too. You're Becoming."

Will raises a shaky hand, presses it against the Other's face. Squeezes, like he can crumple its face beneath his fingers.

_"Please…"_

He launches himself forward, knocking the Other to the ground, and snarls in its face. The movement jostles his belly, a sharp pain erupts beneath his ribs and he gasps.

"No one's coming. You're lying. You just like it when I'm afraid. I'm not afraid. I'm not afraid."

He presses his hands down on the Other's throat, eyes never leaving that damnable smile, vision swimming, he can feel the pulse beneath its skin, it's alive, so alive, that should be for _him,_ he needs it, needs it, needs to consume it and make it part of himself so they’re all one and the same, one and the same, its life for his life for its life for his life and oh God he's so _hungry._

**Hungry.**

"He's here," the Other whispers.

A darkness falls over them, painting the entire scene in a dark indigo and sickly greens.

A gentle touch, tenderly ruffling through his hair.

Two large, ebony hands covering his, helping him take what's his, helping him Become.

"This is what you wanted. You asked for it. It's your fault."

He doesn't know who's speaking anymore. His voice rattles in his skull, pounding against his forehead, begging to come out.

Blood wells up from the Other's chest, unfurling like leaves. Its chest splits, bone petals unfurling and inside lay the viscera, glimmering like jewels.

**Hungry.**

"You came," Will whispers, disbelieving, and the stag man nuzzles him affectionately, its breath brushing past Will's ear.

**Eat.**

Will eats. Messily, blood covering his hands and embedding itself in his nails, flesh and skin tearing beneath his fingers, juices running down his chin.

He's _ravenous._

He's never been so hungry, and nothing has ever tasted so delicious. He sucks his fingers and pulls them out of his mouth one by one, _pop! pop! pop!_ licking them each clean.

_"That's it. That's it, Will."_

He becomes aware of another urge. Another hunger. One itch scratched, but not the other.

The stag man rolls him over onto his back, gently cups its hands over his swelling belly, leans down to press its face against the stretched skin as though it could hear something inside.

_"Beautiful. You're beautiful, Will."_

It pries open his insect legs, strange and thin and sharp. He allows it, opening up with a sigh of content, the flavor of meat still sitting comfortably in his mouth. 

"Yes. Yes."

With a growl, it thrusts in and _oh,_ that feels good, that feels good. Its claws are gentle, pricking his skin, cradling his hips gently even as its thrusts grow brutal. The bubble of his belly sways with the movement, rocking back and forth between them. Will thinks he can hear the sound of crying.

Above him the stag man looms, eyes boring into his, its ivory-white smile gentle. His legs drum against its back limply, framing the gross growth of his stomach. It changes its angle and he whines, arching as best as he can, fingers scrabbling against the dirty carpet as he tosses his head back and moans.

_“You’re perfect. So perfect, Will. You’ve done so well. Marvelous.”_

The stag man flickers, glitches. Its hands on his hips are strangely warm. Its voice strangely familiar.

“Ah—ah—ah—” Small sounds are pushed out of him with every thrust. He clings to its shoulders, eyes glazed over with pleasure. The face of the stag man grows clearer, more familiar. More dear to him. It’s revealing itself to him, bit by bit, and he peers through the gloom, desperate to _see,_ to _know,_ to— 

  
  
  


“Hannibal?”

He doesn’t realize he’s spoken until he hears his own voice. Hannibal is fucking him, his suit stained with blood, pants down to his thighs, hair in disarray and sweat shining on his forehead. He gently lays his hand upon Will’s cheek, leans down, and kisses him.

“I’m here, Will. Don’t worry. It’ll all be okay.”

Will is confused. What is Hannibal doing here? Hannibal doesn’t belong in his nightmares. Hannibal is real. Hannibal is his friend, his friend that he relies on to tell him when the thing that goes bump in the night is nothing more than another ghost floating around in his head. Hannibal isn’t supposed to be part of this. Hannibal is supposed to be safe.

The kiss tastes like blood. Will’s eyebrows furrow and he makes a fussy little sound, sluggishly turning his face away, letting his neck go lax. And stares into the eyes of the hotel manager lying dead next to him, his chest torn open. His head begins to pound.

“Hannibal,” he says, voice going high and panicky, “Hannibal, what—”

“Shhh. I’m going to take care of you. Of both of you. Don’t worry about a thing.”

Will looks back up at him, the faint prickling of horror converging upon him, still not quite comprehending but knowing enough to realize that something is wrong. Hannibal fondles his cock and Will gasps again, biting his lip.

“You,” he says. “It’s you.” 

He comes with a choked whine, and everything goes black.

* * *

When he wakes, he can’t move. His limbs feel heavy, fatigued. When he manages to get his fingers to twitch, to curl his wrists, he finds that they’re bound down by his side. It feels so much like the sleep paralysis he wonders if that’s how Hannibal did it.

“You killed Harley.”

Hannibal’s voice floats in from some corner of the room he can’t see.

“Harley? Oh, him. Yes.”

“You were planning on framing me?”

Hannibal’s laugh has sharp edges, like cracked pottery.

“Oh, no, Will. Don’t worry. They won’t find any connection between him and you. There was never one in the first place."

Will gulps.

“You’re the Ripper.”

Hannibal finally comes into view, his face shadowed by the light overhead.

“Not just the Ripper.”

“Oh? Not _just_ a bloodthirsty serial killer? What else? A liar, perhaps?”

Hannibal gently cups Will’s face, tilting his chin up, fingers pressing into his jaw. Will is hyper-aware of how powerful those hands are. How weak he is, right now.

“I am also the father of our child.”

Will stares at him, blankly. Mute.

“I’m sorry, Will. You weren’t ready to know.”

Then, like water wrung from stone, Will begins to laugh. It bubbles up through his cracked ribs, tender and sore from how hard his heart beats against it, or perhaps from the devil-child kicking at it from within his belly.

“This isn’t real,” Will continues to laugh, hysterical peals bursting out from a deep well within him. “This isn’t fucking real.”

Hannibal strokes a thumb over his lips. 

“Darling,” he says, soft and sympathetic, “this is as real as it gets, for you and I.”

Will giggles, tears running down his cheeks. He can’t breathe.

It’s true, isn’t it? They’ve come full circle. Hallucinations, dreams, reality, unreality, monsters, monstrous men. All jumbled up, all entangled. Will, Hannibal. Inextricable. Reality is nothing if not tissue-thin, and ripping through its fabric is this nightmare, hyper-real, bearing down upon them in saturated technicolor, the closest thing to truth there ever was. And truth is nothing if not a nightmare.

“So what now? You let this thing eat me from inside out? Let it claw its way out into the world to join you, and tie off a loose end at the same time?”

“Oh, Will. I’m not going to let you die,” Hannibal tuts, patronizing. He turns, and drags a metal cart into view. On top of it lies the mangled corpse of the hotel manager.

“First, we eat,” Hannibal says.

“And then?”

Hannibal smiles, and his sharp, white teeth wink at Will from between his lips.

“And then, we begin.”

**Author's Note:**

> Outtake:  
> Will: so how does this work i dont have a uterus  
> Hannibal: i implanted fertilized eggs on the inside wall of ur digestive tract  
> Will: that makes no sense, first of all why the hell do u need me if u can just fertilize eggs all by your fucking self, second of all, there’s no umbilical chord, why are they growing so big, what are they feeding off of  
> Hannibal: they feed off the nutrients coming from your body  
> Will: the nutrients in my ass?  
> Hannibal:  
> Will: oh i see. Your kind grows on shit. No wonder you’re so full of it.
> 
> also, fun fact: the soup that hannibal gives will is supposed to be chinese medicinal soup? i was looking up different kinds and found a recipe for bream and green papaya soup that's supposed to be good for pregnant women and seemed sufficiently weird enough for hannibal to take on, but ended up taking that detail out bc in reality chinese medicinal stuff, the good ones, are tailored for each person with a unique combination of herbs and whatnot. u need to go to a chinese medicinal doctor and they'll like ask u abt ur symptoms and give u instructions on how to brew it and everything. it's a whole practice---no amount of googling (if this information could even be found in english online) wouldve let me really figure out the intricacies of it. i only know that hannibal only got the very best for will!
> 
> come find me on twitter if ur heart so desires [@nise_kazura](https://twitter.com/nise_kazura)! 


End file.
